Things I Love Thursday

Posted on 28 July 2011 | Comments Off on Things I Love Thursday

First off: A very happy birthday to my two wonderful friends who were born on the same day today twenty-one years ago! May you both be as happy and healthy as anyone can wish.

I didn’t post last week because I was tired of the Blog Squad aggregate page cloning my posts, but it seems to be behaving now (fingers crossed this doesn’t jinx it). So my weekly collection of things I think are cool:

♥ One of my all-time favourite things about Translink is the Poetry in Transit project: short poems or extracts on the inside tops of busses, where the ads usually go. You can read all the current ones on the website, if you like; I haven’t, because I enjoy the occasional surprise of finding a new poem on the bus.

♥ The surprise fireworks display at Coal Harbour last Saturday — and the upcoming Celebration of Light this weekend! I’m planning on seeing all the fireworks this year; the competitors this year promise to be most excellent.

♥ One of my friends pointed out the magnificent-sounding interactive e-book by an ex-Pixar designer, The Fantastic Flying Books of Mr Morris Lessmore, available on the iPad. Check it out, read about it, or buy it for $4.99:

[vimeo http://vimeo.com/25833596]

 
♥ Another great link for anyone interested in animation is the Animator Letters Project, a website collecting letters from professional animators to aspiring ones.

♥ Seeing the utter joy on a friend’s face when you find a really good present for them.

♥ I’ve been listening over and over to Simple Plan’s ‘Jet Lag’ (featuring Natasha Bedingfield). (Apparently, there’s also a French version with Marie-Mai.)

♥ The knee-high child who ran up and hugged my leg (however mistakenly, thinking I was his mother) at the UBC Bookstore last Saturday.

♥ Most of all, I love Vancouver in all its glory rays:

Kitsilano beach at sunset

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39. Donate my hair

Posted on 26 July 2011 | 2 comments

Last Thursday night, a brave friend and her kitchen scissors sawed off the vast majority of my hair:

It looks a bit like the tail end of some poor, dead animal, doesn’t it? For reference, most of that hair ranges from 8 to 11 inches long. It’s layered, so a few bits don’t qualify, but we cut it off in one go rather than worry about measuring each strand.

And I got a proper trim at the hairdresser’s the next day, much to my friend’s relief. So I am now sporting a much shorter haircut, and the hair was mailed off today to Eva & Co. Wigs, the company recommended by UBC’s Cuts for Cancer.

Eva & Co. Wigs makes and donates wigs to the Canadian Cancer Society, and accepts ponytails of at least 8 inches in length (including the shortest hair in a layered ponytail). For more information on donating to Eva & Co. Wigs, visit their website, or check out the Canadian Cancer Society for information on donating to other organisations throughout the country.

Their mailing address is:

Hair Donation Program
107-950 Broadway St W
Vancouver BC  V5Z 1K7 

(Yes, the address listed here is formatted a little differently to the one on their website because if there’s anything I learned in my various customer service/administrative jobs is how to address an envelope properly according to Canada Post regulations. I’ve become extremely anal pedantic since then, i.e. please note that there are no commas or full stops unless part of the address name, the postal code does appear on the same line as city and province, and that there are two spaces between the province and the postal code.)

(This was obviously a far too important aspect of my life at one time.)

Some random facts I’ve learned in the process of growing out and donating my hair:

  • It takes between 8 to 12 ponytails to make a single wig. Each ponytail is worth between US$100-200.
  • Hair donation programs have different requirements for their ponytails, so look carefully! Some accept dyed hair, while others don’t. Lengths also vary, though the bare minimum seems to be 8 inches.
  • Long hair gets split ends easily. It took me more months than I expected to grow my hair out, because I had to get it trimmed every few months to get rid of those persnickety ends.
  • It cost approximately CA$10 to mail my hair, including purchasing a sufficiently large envelope.
  • Short hair is prickly to sleep on.

On a more personal note, this is one of those things I am particularly glad to cross off my Day Zero list, not just to say ‘I did it!’, but because quite a few people in my circles of caring have been diagnosed with cancer in the last two months alone. Donating my hair doesn’t change the lives of anyone I know, but I suppose it’s my gesture of changing something small for someone somewhere, in the face of otherwise helplessness.

The good news is, everyone I know is dealing with their diagnoses, and currently there’s nothing to do but wait and keep an eye on things.

Much love to my beautiful friends and relatives. Your courage and positivity are an inspiration to everyone around you.

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Posted in Day Zero, Involvement / Leadership

As much a test as an apology

Posted on 16 July 2011 | 2 comments

So for those of you who read the Blog Squad aggregate page, you are probably as annoyed as I am embarrassed to discover that it’s been replicating my most recent post, oh, only about a few dozen times.

After diving about twenty pages in, it seems that the aggregate is having some problems with a couple of WordPress.com-based blogs (though not all), and is cloning away to its heart’s content. I don’t know why it happened, but I did email someone who will hopefully forward the problem to someone who can do a bit of a clean-up.

Except, of course, this post may backfire and reload some 109472 times before then, in which case you can have my apologies 109472 times over.

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Posted in Recreation

Things I Love Thursday

Posted on 14 July 2011 | 2 comments

Tumultuous week! Summer this year is not shaping up to be quite the golden age I was hoping for, but there are some shiny bits regardless. First off, this great quote:

‘The discovery of a new dish does more for the happiness of the human race than the discovery of a new star.’
– Brillat-Savarin (1755-1826), French lawyer and gourmet

So true, so very, very true — in my case, anyway. Other great things I love:

♥ People who feed me candy. I have a drawer in my office desk dedicated to stashing sweet gifts; it helps keep me from low blood sugar.

♥ Speaking of feeding candy, Cut the Rope is my new favourite game on the iPod Touch. (Also available for Androids.)

♥ Satisfying my mussels craving at Salade de Fruits on Tuesday. A giant pot of mussels and a massive pile of fries for $14. Yes, please!

♥ This has been the coolest Vancouver summer I’ve had in the last four years, what with the random rain and wild temperature fluctuations. It’s made me all the more appreciative of days when we do have high skies and relentless sunshine (and here’s a little wish for more).

♥ Spotting a raccoon in our backyard when I was dropping by briefly to pick up a charger. Not a common sight in urban Vancouver in the daytime!

♥ How long the long grass grows.

♥ Basking under the sun at the Stanley Live concerts last Saturday and playing an impromptu game of peekaboo with two laughing toddler girls who decided that was they wanted to do with my otherwise lazy form.

♥ I have literally thousands of images saved on my computer. I love pictures and quotes. Although I haven’t had time to collect any more lately, I still like to browse through what I have because sometimes, something like this is exactly what I need:

Happy Thursday and have a good weekend!

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5 guidelines for enjoying outdoor movies

Posted on 11 July 2011 | 2 comments

FreshAirCinema is once again bringing movies to the great outdoors for free this summer. I was in Stanley Park last Tuesday to watch their first offering, Jurassic Park. Having never watched a movie outdoors before, I realised there were a few things I would have liked to know beforehand.

1. If going with a large group, you will probably need to stake out a spot. Plan dinner accordingly.
Since I was only going with one other person, we decided to eat downtown before we headed to Stanley Park; when we arrived, the place was seething with people. It’s much easier for two to find a small space to squeeze in than five, though, so it may be a better idea to bring food with you if you’re going as a group.

2. The movie doesn’t start when they say it will.
The movie was meant to start at 9:00 pm but was pushed to 9:30 pm because of the late sunset, which is fine, but at 9:30 pm we got half an hour of promotions before the movie itself started playing at 10:00 pm. If I’d known it would be that late, I might not have gone as it was difficult for me to get home afterwards.

3. Bring a thick blanket or towel and warm clothing. If you might get hungry, bring snacks and a warm drink.
Although I did bring a towel, I forgot that Vancouver nights are chilly, especially if you’re outdoors, and it’s a good idea to bring a warm jacket or hoodie to pull over your head. A warm drink in a flask is also a good idea if you’re prone to feel cold like I am.

4. People will smoke weed. Be prepared to counter the smell if you don’t like it.
My favourite item in cases like these (when I can find it) is scented tissue; barring that, anything that smells remotely pretty goes a long way, e.g. scented hand sanitizer, perfume sprayed on a paper strip, etc. Of course, if you do like the smell, you won’t need to bring anything at all.

5. A torch is a very handy tool.
Stanley Park is dark at night and it’s hard to pick your way through if you haven’t got a bright light to shine the way ahead for you. In a pinch, an iPod or a mobile phone light will do, but a torch is definitely the best item and is relatively inexpensive to pick up at a dollar store.

Although I’m not going to watch any more for a while, I do plan on catching another two before the end of the summer and will be much more ready next time around.

(For a full list of shows, check out FreshAirCinema’s Facebook events page. Happy viewing!)

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Posted in Recreation